Sunday, October 16, 2011

Porcine goodness at Daorae Korean BBQ - Sri Petaling outlet.

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There are tons of Korean BBQ restaurants in and around KL (and its surrounding areas). Vast majority of them are single-shop outlets though; Daorae is the only one I can think of that operates on a chain-restaurant, many-outlets-around-town style. We're trying out the Sri Petaling outlet to see if it's any good!

I don't know if you feel the same, but when I first started eating Korean BBQ years ago, you had to grill your own meat. This gave a pretty good sense of "attachment" to the meat, since ... well you know, since you cooked it yourself. Nowadays almost all joints have foreigners cooking the meat for you at your table though. Perhaps the restaurants don't want you to screw up the cooking of the meat and then subconsciously think "ew the food here sucks."

Salt-spice oil, garlic, and other condiments. And a big jug of cold water without needing to ask for it. In my opinion all restaurants should do this, not just Korean ones.

Of course, no Korean meal is complete without the accompanying side dishes, or banchan. These are either "complimentary," or "priced into the bill" depending on how you want to look at it. We found that the kimchi was nice, but the rest of the dishes were very ordinary.

While we're snacking on the banchan, a waiter cooks up our pork! We hardly ever eat beef at Korean BBQ's - mostly because of the price. Pork belly and pork loin normally runs rm20-rm25 per serving, but beef rib-eye can be more than twice that. Why is beef that much more expensive than pork? I buy my rib-eye steaks at Jaya Grocer for rm8/100gm. But anyway, once it's cooked, grab a slice (or two), dip it in your sauce of choice, wrap it in a salad leaf, add whatever else you want, and voila! Heavenly bite-sized morsel.

We found Daorae overall solid but not outstanding. There are plenty of other Korean BBQ joints with better and more value-for-money food. Specifically in this neck of the woods, I'd prefer a short drive over to Taman Danau Desa to eat at Seoul Korea. The place is dirtier, warmer, and darker, but food's better - and if memory serves me right - a little cheaper, too!

Daorae is in Sri Petaling, along the same road as the Sri Petaling Hotel, and opposite the Shell service station. Non-halal (obviously).